TEHRAN – Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Tuesday that the U.S. travel ban gives full license to bigotry, calling it a “sad” move.

“US Supreme Court defends and allows Trump’s Muslim Ban to go into full effect, giving bigotry full license in U.S.A. Sad!” Zarif tweeted.

The U.S. Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration on Monday to fully enforce a ban on travel to the U.S. by residents of six mostly Muslim countries including Iran.

The ban means that the U.S. would categorically refuse entry visas to prospective travelers from Chad, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen, plus North Korea and Venezuela.

According to CNBC, lower courts had said people from those nations with a claim of a “bona fide” relationship with someone in the U.S. could not be kept out of the country. Grandparents, cousins and other relatives were among those courts said could not be excluded.

Trump’s first ban was issued in January quickly blocked by a series of lower court rulings. The second attempt was also blocked by the lower courts but eventually allowed to come into effect in a limited form over the summer.

NA/PA